


crash

by bookstvnerdlove



Series: The Universe at Large [1]
Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-23
Updated: 2014-05-23
Packaged: 2018-01-26 05:56:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1677248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookstvnerdlove/pseuds/bookstvnerdlove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>first kiss. partly contrived, partly chance. she draws him near and nature does the rest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	crash

It doesn’t happen the way she thought it would, all fiery combustion and lips and tongue and teeth. Instead it happens (almost) by accident when she’s aiming the crossbow for target practice.

She can hear his body shift the minute she takes aim. Even though he’s been teaching her for a while, she always tries to hold the weapon just a little bit wrong so that he’ll have to come closer. It’s a cheap trick, but she doesn’t care, not when it gets him right by her side, to touch her with his calloused fingers in ways that make her stomach clench.

(She remembers in the time before, the tactics were different. The right music to set a mood and shiny lip gloss that tasted like strawberry. Or a jammed locker and some lip biting to draw eyes downward.)

Now the forest is so quiet that she can hear every microsecond of his gait until he’s right behind her. He doesn’t say anything, just slides his hand over hers and adjusts her shoulder before taking a few steps back.

(She likes how quiet he is with everybody. She finds that she could spend hours staring into the depths of his irises if he let her. Reading his unspoken thoughts, the same as the ones burned in her soul.)

She’s about to pull when a bird screeches and flies, rabidly, out of the trees. She jumps back, forgetting how close he is, and their bodies crash to the ground. They land, her back to his front, his arms around her to shield her fall. (And she both loves that he does this for her but hates that she’s still not strong enough in his eyes to protect herself.)

They just lie there for a moment, neither of them moving, waiting to hear if the inevitable sound of a walker, gasping and moaning, follows the bird. Her heart is pounding and she can feel the increased thumping of his at her back. All she wants to do is snuggle in further, to crawl as close to his body as possible and draw in his heat.

Instead, when they know it’s safe, he nudges her back to prompt her to move. All she feels is reluctance to leave the circle of his arms. So that’s when she makes the choice, the decision to take what’s been brewing and confront it, head on. Instead of leaving his grasp she rolls her body, in slightly jerky movements, until she’s facing him.

He’s lying completely still, as if he’s afraid of what she is going to do next, but isn’t moving to stop her. She just whispers his name, “Daryl,” and she’s leaning down into him when he finally snaps.

And as their lips crash together, so awkward and surprising at first, until softening into something more, all she can think is,  _finally_.


End file.
